A review of the structural performance of single-family, wood-frame houses is presented. The performance of these structures in selected earthquakes and hurricanes is summarized. In general, wood-frame houses performed well with relatively few instances of structural failures and without serious loss of lives. The review of experimental research covers studies on full-scale houses, shear walls and intercomponent connections. The development of analytical procedures to predict component and structural behavior under different types of loading is also presented. It is found that while significant progress has been made in recent years in analytical modeling of shear walls and horizontal diaphragms, only limited progress has been made on the modeling of a complete house and intercomponent connections. Based on this review, a multi-year research program is proposed to determine the baseline performance of single-family houses.